Turning one Female branch to Male for pollen

[The Hemp Goddess]

Responsible breeders start with a mother plant that they have tested and stressed to make sure that it has no hermy tendencies whatsoever. You should not just take any old plant and cause it to hermy. You need to start out with good stock to begin with. This is the reason that I am not crazy about Subcool's gear. He thinks a certain percentage of hermy plants are okay. There truly is way more to it than just throwing chemicals at your plant.

QB, IMHO, autos were created for those growers too lazy/impatient to do it right--they basically watered down the genetics with ditch weed to make it easier to grow. And you're probably right about selling more seeds.

Sorry, but I will continue to rail against the bastardization of cannabis--the irresponsible creation of fem seeds without the safeguards to prevent hermies--the watering down of the genetics to make it easier to grow.

 

[Aksarben]

Well, I wouldn't go so far to call cannabis ruderalis species ditch weed. This link from Dinafem (pretty well known) Seeds explains a lot of the creation of Autoflowers: https://www.maximumyield.com/breeding-with-autoflowering-cannabis/2/4064

And this link has more history on Autoflowers, which is really good reading -> https://howtogrowmarijuana.com/breed-autoflowering-marijuana-seeds/

Regular seeds are less epxensive than either autoflower, or feminized. The demand for feminized has shot up as well as those of Autoflower hybrids.

1. Shorter so easier to conceal in your back yard or balcony, or more adaptable to growing in grow rooms and tents inside appartments
2. Short duration from germination to harvest, so you can have more variety, and get in more than one crop/year
3. Breed now to have a lot more potency and characteristic of other hybrids, such as Zkittlez, Northern Lights, Jack Herer and others
4. Less equipment needs. Some have even grown miniature plants in Dixie Cups. However, using enough good soil, growing outdoors will give you the best overall yield.
5. You can grow an autoflower variety to mature way before the fall rains and issues with molds appear... or frost.


We all have our likes and dislikes. I just happen to be one among many growers that like the idea of feminized seeds and autoflowers.

 

[SmokeRich211]

This is actually just one branch of the plant, which i cloned for this. The rest of the plant is doing great for making female buds and has nice colas, considering it has blown off my outside stand on my porch a coupe of times.. LOL Wife actually wants me to perfect this so she can sell the seeds. Novelty hemp seeds of course. "wink - wink"
This is the plant the branch I cloned came from:
View attachment 253969

Imagine falling into money ocean. Maybe years later, I will work it, know more about the clone thing, and make the cannabis growth easily.

 

[SmokeRich211]

This is actually just one branch of the plant, which i cloned for this. The rest of the plant is doing great for making female buds and has nice colas, considering it has blown off my outside stand on my porch a coupe of times.. LOL Wife actually wants me to perfect this so she can sell the seeds. Novelty hemp seeds of course. "wink - wink"
This is the plant the branch I cloned came from:
View attachment 253969

Imagine falling into the money ocean, we can see the beautiful future that we can work out, know more about the clone and grow cannabis easily.

 

[SmokeRich211]

One more thing.... In Ed Rosenthal's book "Marijuana Grower's Handbook" on pages 421 to 425 making feminized seeds is discussed, including an insert from founder of DUTCH PASSION SEED COMPANY, (Netherlands) Henk Van Dalen who uses chemicals to suppress the Ethylene production to make Feminized seeds. Ed Rosenthal even talks about making and using STS to create feminized seeds on page 425. Virtually all commercial seed producers use this method to create the feminized seeds they sell you. I merely am able to do it at home due to my lab experience and about anyone with care and following direction of the recipe/formula, has access to do the same.

I will get the books and research, always study, know more, grow better and save money. Thanks for your share, Aksarben

 

[Aksarben]

"Marijuana Grower's Handbook" by Ed Rosenthal is a really nice book to have, to read, and reference. Well worth the money for it. Also, for history of Cannabis there is probably none better ( a bit expensive) than Jack Herer's book "The Emperor Wears No Clothes" Ed Rosenthal's book (link) https://tinyurl.com/y4neusrr and Jack Herer's book (link) https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1878125028
Both great reading.

 

[Aksarben]

Now that I have female pollen from the HWS High Density, I pollinated one small bud on the original plant and one lower bud on an Amnesia Auto. The High Density Auto grew very nice with nice looking structure, which is a cross of Big Bud Auto x White Dwarf Auto with 18-20% THC and CBD around 0.3%; 80% Indica. When my Jack Herer get up to size I will probably get 1 branch from one and apply STS to it to get it to produce female pollen as well. Might be intersting to see what a High Density Auto X Jack Herer Auto might also produce. It will throw a little more Sativa into the mix that way.

Most strains of cannabis will produce some male flowers if stressed too much. Some are more prone than others. It is not a reliable way to get female pollen from a female plant, and breeders use either STS (preferred) or colloidal silver to make a female turn to male pollen. Basically what happens is that the STS inhibits the production of Ethylene that halts the production of female organs and consequently produce male organs, but with XX chromosomes and no XY (male).

Ed Rosenthal, et al ., have written about the production of making feminized seeds in their writings. and the ways it can be accomplished.

 

[Aksarben]

Also this link about producing Feminized seeds. I quote a piece of the article... "
Urban legends and lies about feminized seeds

Despite the fact that, after two decades of cannabis cultivation, many of the false myths surrounding feminized seeds have been debunked, from time to time we still hear some arguments like the ones shown below. As is often the case, many of these stories are spread by people who have never grown this type of seeds or have none or very limited experience with them. Ignorance is always a bad thing, and that's why we want to emphasize several points in relation to feminized seeds and the myths that often go with them; myths such as the following:

Feminized seeds produce hermaphrodite plants:

The problem with monoecious hermaphrodite plants has more to do with the parents used (and if they exhibit any hermaphrodite trait) rather than with the type of seeds produced. If to create a feminized seed you use a female plant with a tendency to produce male flowers, part of its offspring will likely inherit that characteristic, whether the said female plant is used as a pollen donor (after reversing its sex) or as a recipient of pollen (letting it flowering as usual). Yet the same thing happens when producing regular seeds: if the male or female parents are not stable in this respect, neither will be their offspring (or at least part of it).


Marijuana and hermaphroditism- Alchimiaweb "

Article link: How to make feminised cannabis seeds- Alchimiaweb

 

[Aksarben]

By the way, all the seeds of my cross of HWS High Density Auto X Jack Herer Auto all came out Feminized in growing this year, with no sign of hermaphrodite tendency. They are all Female, so will see how the cross consumes. This year I'm collecting pollen from a Girl Scout Cookie Auto to cross with Gelato #33 and maybe also with Bubba Kush Auto. I will also self cross the GSC with itself for female seeds for next year. If the Jack Herer Auto X High Density Auto turn our good after trying I will probably make more of the same.

 

[Aksarben]

One more thing. This link from Royal Queen Seeds tells a bit about making feminized seeds.
https://www.royalqueenseeds.com/blog-how-to-make-feminized-cannabis-seeds-like-the-pros-n1117

 

[WeedHopper]

Aksarban,,i read your thread from the beginning. Very interesting read. Seems it has all worked out for you. I have never grown a feminized strain so i dont know anything about them. I have grown Autos and they have come along ways since the first Lowryders. Lowryders sucked but ive grown some Autos that were pretty decent bud with a good buzz.
If ya want a test grower let me know.

 

[Aksarben]

Bubbletrouble, the only thing different about Feminized seeds is they were produced with the notion, both Auto and normal Photo period strains,, that the resulting seed germinates and grows only Female plants. Thereby avoiding the necessity of weeding out (culling) any males on a straight run.

As with a lot of things, it is a matter of buyer's choice. Take chickens for example. When they are hatched, many times the females (hens) are separated from the males (roosters). This if for egg production and sometimes for only meat. Roosters are often allowed to grow into adult birds for meat production. Sometimes you get "straight run" chicks which are not separated in sexes. Many farms and ranches buy straight runs, keeps the hens when they mature,and butcher nearly all of the roosters, saving one or two for future production. You only need one rooster for several hens. Same with weed. You would only need one for a WHOLE bunch of plants to create seeds, but the resulting seeds from a male and female cross would be kind of a hybrid, and all the seeds would not be just one sex, but about 50-50.

When you create feminized pollen that only has XX chromosomes if it also fertilizers the same plant, then the DNA is merely, or should be, what the parent is. OG Kush feminized seeds, allowed to grow and be hanged (at least one branch) into male, will pass on the same DNA into the seeds and so the OG Kush is still OG Kush, and not a OG Kush by some other male. However, you can take something like OG Kush or any strain that you have "changed" the sex on and cross it with another female of a different strain, and the result will not only be seeds that are all female, but the DNA contributed by the changed branch/plant will have an influence on the resulting seeds hence the cross.

This year I have taken Girl Scout Cookies Auto, gotten one branch to go male and the resulting XX chromosome pollen I crossed with Strawberry Cheesecake Auto as well as Gellato #33 Auto. The GSC Auto DNA will give me attributes of both GSC Auto and Strawberry Cheesecake Auto. how it turns out, I will have to wait until next after I grow the feminized seeds to see how well it turned out. This is a lot how new crosses in Autoflowers are made. BTW, you cannot just take an Autoflower strain and cross it with a photo period strain and hope for "dwarf" short plants and short lived plants. The gene that is in Autoflower plants is a recessive gene and requires a number of back crossing to get a stable Autoflower plant.

 

[spaade]

...well done!

 

[oregongrowguy]

Thanks for lining this out! I studied all of the resources you suggested. In a couple weeks I'm going to try to make feminized seeds from some photoperiod clones as practice. This spring I'll plan to create feminized auto seeds from some auto fem seeds. Maybe play with doing some crosses in the future. I have not grown auto flower before, but I am hoping it will help me harvest before the rain/pest/disease comes in September. When is best to top the seedling and when to cut a side branch (or two) for the clone to spray with STS?

 

[The celts are here]

I make my own auto strains using CS spray and ive never had a hermie plant,

 

[The celts are here]

And you will not get feminized seeds. So not so impressed with you making plants hermaphrodite. Just don't share your seeds please, it can ruin crops.

You don’t know what your talking about ,
I’ve sprayed hundreds of female plants with CS spray and never had a hermie plant go educate yourself or don’t say nothing

 

[The celts are here]

Good job this is how I make female seeds but I use cs
Spray

I have some Autoflower growing and have a Heavy Weight Seed (HWS) High Density Auto that I experimented on to see about making "female" pollen for making up more feminized seeds. I work in the lab at a local winery and I made up a 2 part concoction that when blended together, "A" = "B" I end up with Silver Thio Sulfate or STS for short. I sprayed one arm of this plant, near the bottom, with this STS cut with RO water at least 2 times daily at the nodes and where it looked like female flowers were beginning to form. Kept it up for several days. I have posted a picture here to get input if I was succcessful in transforming a female to male. I realize if I pollinate another High Density Auto that it should still be High Density Auto, but because I used pollen that does not have the normal DNA from a male, all the seeds produced from such a plant should be feminized.

If I use this pollen on some Jack Herer Auto I just started up, will they also have feminized seeds? I realize it will be a cross of Jack Herer Auto (Seedsman) X HWS High Density Auto. I have one Jack Herer Auto (Seedsman) that is a little older than the others that just started and I could do the same to it when it gets big enough, and then use that pollen to fertilize the female Jack Herer plants to have true feminized Jack Herer Auto seeds.

View attachment 253966

View attachment 253967

View attachment 253968

I believe from the pictures that I was successful at turning a single stem from Female to Male for pollen.

 

[WeedHopper]

Celts,,Rose is not here anymore. She left with the other clowns. Same asshats that told me several yrs ago i couldn't use H0T5s from start to finish. WRONG,,,,,I grew some killer dank with nice buds with an 4ft 8tube H0T5 system that put out 40,000 lumens. I used the 6500K tubes for Vegg and 2700k tubes for flower.
I educated thier ass and filled up some jars.